Harry Potter and the Necromantic War
by Aimey Antillies
Summary: due to cussing. Slash. More Snape inside. closest to a summery as we know is included inside.
1. Prologue

This is the only time I will ever - and I mean ever - do a disclaimer. I, along with my fellow writers Yukie and Tabloid do not own anything Harry Potter.. I own a copy of the books but that's about it.  
  
^*^*^*^*^*^*^*^*^*^*^*^*^*^*^*^*^ Summary: This story may focus a bit more on Snape but it's because I love him.Harry's still the main character. I think. It incorporates the Sandman by Neil Gaiman (if you haven't read anything by him I suggest Sandman and his co-written book with Terry Prachet Good Omens) it also includes necromancers. We first got the idea from the Sabriel series by Garth Nix. We expanded it though. Necromancers are looked down on like were-wolves. ^*^*^*^*^*^*^*^*^*^*^*^*^*^*^*^*^*^ Warning: Most everybody in this story is foul mouthed. Hence the rating. I think we overdid it but meh.  
  
Pairings: Snape / Lupin, Black / OC, McGonagall / OC, Draco/Harry, Ron/ Hermione (Think that's it)  
  
^*^*^*^*^*^*^*^*^*^*^*^*^*^*^*^*^*^  
  
Every good story ends sometime. A story isn't told, after all, until it has ended.  
  
However, stories are a reflection of life, which tends to hop merrily along in a sort of spiral dance.you go round about until you arrive back at the beginning..but usually not in the precise place where it started.  
  
Every time a story is told, it changes. Every time a story ends, a new one begins.  
  
For one person right now a new story is beginning.but of course, not in the precise place where it started.  
  
No one can quite explain it, but that is simply how it is.  
  
Nine months after the death of an old way of life, an old point of view, someone had a baby. Her name was Shinobu, and she was married to a man named Silvanus Maximillian Snape, but the baby was probably not his. Neither of them cared very much about this. Silvanus was happy that he was going to have an heir, and Shinobu was happy because she was going to have a child. Though not your traditional maternal woman by any stretch of the imagination, she was nonetheless very capable of loving children.mostly because they are innately evil, and she likes that very much.  
  
The baby was eventually named Severus Oneiros Yumejirou Snape. The only reason Severus - Silvanus's choice - ended up being his first name was that Shinobu was very tired from having given birth. However, she got to pick both his middle names, so she was content, and did not curse her husband much that night.  
  
It should be mentioned at this point that Silvanus and Shinobu were a wizard and necromancer/witch respectively.  
  
Severus grew up as normally as possible under these circumstances. When he was eleven, he received a letter from a famous school for wizards, and began attending. He was sorted into the incorrect house, but did not let this deter his study of potions. He was already a far shot more clever than the professor by his third year. This did not bother the professor; she enjoyed having the help around the laboratory, and having someone to discuss rare poisons with. He enjoyed tutoring the younger students (usually), which he was often called to do before difficult lessons.  
  
He made friends with a group of students from the house he felt he should have belonged to. They agreed with this and treated him as an equal and honourary Ravenclaw. He tutored his friends in potions and they attempted to help him pass transfigurations, which he was somewhat abysmal at. He was very good at conjuring wombats, but not much else, although once he managed several undead slugs.  
  
His mother was very proud of him for that and immediately began training him as a Necromancer. This was also in his third year.  
  
Sometimes he felt as if he didn't really have a childhood when he looked back on this, but that didn't upset him as much as he thought it should.  
  
In his fifth year there was an incident with a werewolf that he didn't appreciate, and it bothered him up until quite recently. As of the time this story really begins, he'd forgiven the werewolf (because it really wasn't his fault) and the person who had directed him to the werewolf (grudgingly). This was not easy. Forgiveness was something of a difficult concept for him to grasp, which didn't upset him as much as he thought it should.  
  
Nothing really upset him.  
  
Well, his inability to dream at all sometimes bothered him.  
  
And right now, in the present, it is bothering him. So is a particular student.  
  
This is where the real story begins (again). 


	2. Part the First: Nice Dream or perhaps no...

"Just.pick one, Potter. For the love of Merlin. Stop fluttering about."  
  
Harry Potter, fifteen years old, bespectacled and currently rather nervous, closed his eyes again and ran his palm a few inches above the tabletop, over which was strewn a collection of gemstones, all different shapes and colours. They were meant to be studying dreams in this class, which unnerved him. Usually his dreams weren't pleasant. Usually they predicted the future. Sometimes they showed him what his.well, arch-nemesis wasn't quite a strong enough term.  
  
Mortal enemy wasn't either.  
  
Voldemort was a bit worse than that, and unpleasant to look at as well.  
  
Dreaming of him was stomach-turning, really. He didn't fancy losing his lunch in class in front of a teacher who disliked him. So he was wasting time picking his focus stone.  
  
He thought he might be able to waste five more minutes, but that wasn't the case. He passed his hand over a jade lion-dog, and it fairly jumped into his open palm.  
  
Harry let out a noise that sounded like, 'YARK' and stumbled back. He straightened his glasses and stared.  
  
Snape blinked. "All right then," he said. "That one's yours. Obviously."  
  
Hermione Granger put up her hand. Snape was rather fond of her. She wasn't afraid to speak her mind or ask questions, and she simply laughed in the face of any young man silly enough to suggest she hush up and dumb down.  
  
She was taking this class only because Sybill Trelawney, the usual divinations teacher, had been transferred to Beauxbatons. Apparently the psychic vibrations in England weren't very good anymore. Now Snape was teaching until the new professor arrived. Thankfully he would only be teaching a quarter of a term.  
  
"Sir," Hermione said, clicking Snape's mind back into this plane of existence, "have you a focus already, or are you participating?"  
  
"I do, but I shall not be participating. I don't see the point. I don't dream."  
  
Hermione raised an eyebrow.  
  
"Well, so much for the theory that everyone dreams," Ron Weasley remarked.  
  
"Perhaps he just doesn't remember what he dreams," Parvati Patil suggested.  
  
"No, Miss Patil, I am bereft of any sort of nocturnal wandering."  
  
Parvati looked as if she felt sorry for him, briefly.  
  
Hermione simply looked interested.  
  
"Miss Granger, please put that eyebrow down, I am not a specimen."  
  
"Excuse me," she said, and did.  
  
Snape cleared his throat. "Right, then. The focal stones you are currently holding, students, are now yours. You will keep them with you at all times. Don't worry about losing them; they have a way of finding their way back to you. If your stone does not find its way back, do not panic like a twit. You will find another.or rather, it will find you."  
  
He sat down in the squashy armchair and steepled his hands, then pulled out a pendant from inside his robes. It was a ruby, dark-red and cut in the shape of a five-point star.  
  
"To satisfy your curiosity, Miss Granger. It was at one point much bigger - roughly two by three inches rectangular - but my younger sister broke it. I have no idea how."  
  
He left the pendant where it was and looked over the students. "Right, then. The lesson will commence in five minutes. Take these five minutes to attempt lotus position, or, if you are sane, find a comfortable position to rest in. .Well. Impressive, Mr. Longbottom! You are the first student in three years to have managed lotus position on the first try."  
  
Neville Longbottom allowed himself a shy grin. Neville was usually incredibly accident-prone. Snape had a feeling that he might hurt himself attempting to get out of lotus position, but hoped the boy would manage all right. Longbottom was daft as a brick, but he meant well, and right now he looked something like a Laughing Buddha after a short stint of dieting.  
  
The room was filled with whispers and the sound of shuffling as the students got comfortable. Silence fell, punctuated only by the sound of the wind outside and light breathing.  
  
Snape closed his eyes as well. It was nice and peaceful in here. The students were actually quiet. He felt he should savour this.  
  
He only got in thirty seconds of savouring, however, before something began to annoy him. He opened one eye and looked over the students, trying to discern who, exactly, was doing all that damned whispering. Instinctively he eyed Potter and Weasley. No.they were still and quiet, and Potter was smiling slightly.  
  
Snape stood slowly and concentrated. The damned whispering was getting louder, and no longer seemed to come from everywhere at once. Now it was emanating from near Longbottom.  
  
Now it was resolving itself into words.  
  
"Longbottom," Snape shouted, making everyone jump. Well, everyone but Neville. The nervous boy stayed as he was, eyes shut, legs crossed, swaying slightly. Lavender Brown inched away from him.  
  
"Neville?" she ventured, and poked his shoulder. He fell over in a small heap.  
  
"Back up," Snape bellowed, herding everyone away from Neville as the whispered curses grew louder still. There was a feeling of nasty familiarity about the voice, one that set his teeth on edge and made him itch to break something.  
  
Harry heard the whispers now, too, and muttered, "What IS that?"  
  
The whisper had three distinct voices, but only one voice. Deeply disturbing, but then again, this particular presence thrived on being deeply disturbing. That was, after all, what he was meant to do.  
  
"Not 'that', exactly, although I would prefer to refer to him as 'that," said Snape, directing the remark at Neville's general area.  
  
As if on cue, the air around the snoozing boy seemed to coalesce. It took on the form of a tallish man, white-haired, black-clad, sporting an impressive pair of mirrored sunglasses that should have looked absurd but somehow didn't.  
  
The strange man stood slowly, an irritatingly smug smirk playing about the corners of his mouth. He didn't seem to notice the students around him at all, though he was careful not to step on Neville. He seemed to walk right through the waking students, but stopped short suddenly.  
  
Snape was approaching him, slowly, peacefully. Harry did not envy the stranger. Whenever Snape approached anyone like that or wore that expression or held his hands just so, he had something unpleasant in mind.  
  
"What the hell?" said the stranger in his odd, triple voice.  
  
Snape smiled, and it was a nasty cold sort of smile.  
  
"And what," he said, "brings you here?"  
  
The stranger swallowed hard. "How the hell do you know me?" he demanded, his voice raspy.  
  
"I'm not quite sure," Snape said smoothly, "but rest assured, my good man, I know you."  
  
The stranger took off his sunglasses to get a better look at Snape, and the class erupted in utter chaos.  
  
The stranger had no eyes. There were only two smaller mouths where his eyes should have been.  
  
Harry leaped onto a chair, wand out. Hermione readied an enormous textbook to hurl - as effective as any stunning spell. Ron simply stayed out of the way.  
  
"Silence," Snape roared, and silence fell.  
  
A change seemed to be coming over Snape now, and Harry slowly lowered his wand in wonder. It was almost as if Snape were becoming someone.something different entirely. He radiated utter authority and calm.  
  
He was changing visibly, too. His hair was hanging much less heavily in his eyes. It seemed to be almost standing the way Hermione's cat's fur did before a storm. Except in this case, Harry thought, Snape was the storm.  
  
The fire in the grate dimmed and died almost entirely, and in the gloom Snape's eyes were pitch black, glittering like distant stars. He seemed paler now, and his wild hair and robes were stirring in a nonexistent breeze.  
  
"Corinthian," he said coolly. "You're extremely lucky, old friend, that you did not destroy yourself in this idiotic attempt to join the waking world again."  
  
The stranger - Corinthian - made a funny rasping sound.  
  
He cleared his throat. This action was very disturbing, as he made three throat-clearing sounds.  
  
"What the hell is it?" Ron howled suddenly, pointing. At that the air of nervous tension in the classroom broke and the students started whispering amongst themselves.  
  
"It is in more trouble than it has ever been in all its existences, Weasley," replied Snape.  
  
"Squee," went Corinthian.  
  
"Perhaps the most intelligent thing you've ever said, that."  
  
Corinthian sputtered a bit, then let out a curse that was probably ancient Greek and pointed at Snape, shaking visibly. "YOU!" he shouted. "You're DEAD! I saw you die! I saw you take your sister's hand and that was it! I went to your damn wake! I saw your successor! And now you're here and alive? Bullshit!"  
  
"Watch your tongue. There are young impressionable people within this chamber."  
  
Corinthian pressed his hands to his temples and said, "YAAAAAHHH," then sat down hard on the floor, twitching.  
  
Snape pointed to Neville. "Your portal home is right there. Go. Close it behind you. Your master will know about this, and I shall strongly suggest to him that he unmake you as.as I did."  
  
Snape trailed off, utterly confused.  
  
Corinthian didn't notice. He nodded frantically and vanished. Neville awoke with a start and hit his head on a beanbag chair.  
  
"Class is dismissed," Snape said as Neville stood. "I need.there are certain things I need to peruse, and you lot are not conducive to perusing. Out." 


	3. Part the Second: In Which we figure out...

^*^*^*^*^*^*^* Shorter. much shorter ^*^*^*^*^*^*^*  
  
As the class climbed out of the tower room, Hermione almost fell onto Harry's head.  
  
"What? You knew who that thing was, too?" Ron hazarded. "Or do you know what happened to Snape? You've got that 'I suddenly had a fantastic thought' look."  
  
Hermione nodded. "That thing was a nightmare," she said. "Literally, a nightmare made and given shape. And Professor Snape."  
  
She started giggling a bit.  
  
"Well, for one, his usual appearance is most likely a glamour."  
  
"How do you figure? Why would he choose to be an ugly git?" Ron blinked,  
  
"Maybe he doesn't want people knowing who he really is," said Harry, who had experience in the matter.  
  
"Exactly. Because he...well, he looked like something I read about in the text."  
  
"You've already read the text?" Ron was now boggling. "I shouldn't be as surprised as I am.but it's four inches thick, Hermione."  
  
Hermione smiled and shrugged. "I'm a fast reader," she said lightly, then cleared her throat (this made Harry and Ron jump a bit) and took a deep breath. "Professor Snape looked like.he looked like what was once supposed to be the Lord of Dreams."  
  
Silence.  
  
".What?" Ron said.  
  
"Did your mother ever tell you of the sandman when you were little?"  
  
"Yeah, sometimes. She said he was like a boy all in white, and he was responsible for all the dreams there are. Kind of like a conductor at those poncy operas Percy goes to."  
  
"The one before that looked like Snape did back in there. Black hair, black robe. Absurdly pale, like someone dead. Sometimes he had a sort of helmet." Hermione gestured.  
  
Harry saw something familiar in the outline she drew in the air. "The book I opened that screamed at me.remember when I tried to storm the library in first year? Hold on a minute."  
  
He pulled some parchment and a quill out of his backpack and scribbled furiously a bit, then held it up. "Ta-dah. And no, drawing is not my strong point, but it looked worse in the book."  
  
What he had drawn was a figure in a black robe. What appeared to be flames decorated the bottom. It wore a strange helmet that looked like a cross between an alien, a dragonfly, and bones, and in its hand was a small pouch, and on its chest was an ornate jewelled necklace.  
  
Next to it was written Here is said the King of Dreams.  
  
"It was spelt oddly, though, I think. It was hard to see. It was yelling at me at the time."  
  
"Like that Ye Olde Englishe," Ron snorted.  
  
"Exactly. With the funny 'f' shape instead of 's' and whatnot."  
  
"It would have been back there," said Hermione. "That book was once used in.well, not dark arts so much as some Muggles giving us all a horrid reputation. But that doesn't matter. What matters is that.well, it's almost impossible, but it could be that after the old King of Dreams died, he got reborn. And he got reborn as Snape."  
  
Ron winced. "Must've done something nasty for that to happen."  
  
*()()()()()()()*  
  
Snape pressed lightly on a torch bracket.  
  
On the other side of the secret passage, Minerva McGonagall let out a sigh as her blackboard slid up. She put down her chalk and crossed her arms.  
  
"I was preparing a lesson, Severus," she said, and then started as she got a good look at him. She took off her glasses, cleaned them, and set them back on her nose.  
  
"You've dropped your glamour," she said.  
  
"Not intentionally," he replied, sitting down heavily on the desk and brushing his hair out of his eyes. This only served to make it stand out in even more odd directions.  
  
"What on earth happened? You look horrid. Well, not horrid as usual."  
  
"Ah, ha, ha."  
  
McGonagall gave him a half-smile. "Well, your slashing wit is still in place, so I know you're sound of mind and body. Now I'll ask you again: what on earth happened."  
  
"Remember when we were students, and I told you my middle names? Well, they are as they are for a reason. I believe I've just had a sort of flashback to a past life."  
  
"Have you been drinking the tea Sybill left?" McGonagall looked alarmed.  
  
"Heavens, no. I value my sanity and neurons." He smirked, and then looked at the ceiling. "Minerva, I just told off the Corinthian. I reduced him to a quivering, squeaking mess. And I liked it immensely, but that's not the point."  
  
"What is? Usually you're more direct than this."  
  
"It just seems absurd."  
  
"I swear I will not laugh."  
  
"I.I remember seeing him before this, and not in the text. I saw him in person. I made him. Then I destroyed him and remade him. He was always flawed, and always a rebellious git.and I don't know why I know this."  
  
"That would certainly worry me, were I in your position." McGonagall drummed her fingers pensively on the blackboard, which had descended back into place. "Especially since it seems that the only logical conclusion is that you are a living incarnation of a dead idea."  
  
"Shockingly, I am not reassured."  
  
McGonagall gave him a look. "I am by nature horrible at reassuring."  
  
"But you're truthful." Snape sighed. "For that, I am eternally grateful. And you've just forced me to stop resisting the moral, which is better for me in the long run. However, I must insist you buy me a mocha because you were the official bearer of bad news."  
  
"Agreed. One mocha, however. Any refills are your responsibility."  
  
"Of course." Snape stood with a sigh. "Well, I suppose I ought to go tell Albus about this. He's probably known all along, though. Albus is like that sometimes. I think I may go visit my potions supplier first, though. Give me time to clear my head by arguing with that small-minded, tight- fisted git behind the counter."  
  
McGonagall snickered. "Go forth and argue. I'll let Albus know you'll be seeing him." 


	4. Part the Third: Reaction and Miscellany...

^*^*^*^*^*Won't be much for a while*^*^*^*^*^*^*^  
  
The Gryffindor lunch table was even louder than usual that day.  
  
"That's prettier than Professor Snape," Seamus snerked, pointing with a fork at Harry's drawing of the old, helmeted Dream King. "But I wouldn't be too shocked if it turned out that the mean old header wasn't human anyhow."  
  
Hermione absently twirled her hair around her finger. "Well, it doesn't exactly give him an excuse for being so nasty, but it explains a bit. If you were the reincarnation of something that wasn't human, you'd be a bit confused and that'd probably make you right crabby."  
  
Harry said, "And it would also explain why Snape doesn't dream.he wasn't kidding about that bit, either. Snape hasn't enough sense of humour to kid, really."  
  
"Well, not with us," Ron said.  
  
"But he can sure make some wicked cracks about us," Harry snickered.  
  
"Don't think you're so special," drawled a familiar voice. "He makes cracks about everyone."  
  
Harry eyed Draco Malfoy, who was looming over his shoulder like a platinum- blonde vulture of some kind.  
  
"Ah, so even you're not spared Snape's mad sense of humour?"  
  
"Are you kidding? Sure, he acts all favouring and nurturing and all that bollocks when you're about, Potter, but the second you and the rest of the Gryfs are out of sight, whammo." Draco gestured madly. "Says it's to keep us from going soft."  
  
Ron made a sort of sceptical noise that elicited a grin from Draco.  
  
"Yeah, I second that 'erngh', Weasley. Maybe half of it's making us tough. The other half's just because he's evil."  
  
"Not so much evil, Mr. Malfoy, as impatient with stupidity."  
  
Draco turned around, regarded Professor Snape, and waved.  
  
"Er. Hello, Professor. Are you a ninja?"  
  
"What?" Seamus asked.  
  
"No, Mr. Malfoy, I am not a ninja - incidentally, Mr. Finnegan, a ninja was an assassin in feudal Japan - but I do take care not to make a noise like a herd of elephants whenever I travel by foot.a lesson every student in this school could benefit from, I assure you."  
  
Hermione blinked. "Professor," she said, "have you.you haven't put your glamour back."  
  
"Are you leaving it off for good?" Neville inquired, then realised what he'd said and attempted to hide behind a milk pitcher.  
  
"Oh, have I forgotten to raise it again?" Snape said absently. "Oh, well, it was trying to keep it up. Focusing on a glamour spell and on the chemical disasters that pass for potions in this institution is extremely trying."  
  
He looked around the room. The students who had been eyeing Snape incredulously looked away very quickly.  
  
"Thank you," Snape said, and strode off.  
  
"So he just stopped by to scare the pants off us, then," Seamus commented.  
  
"It's Snape," Draco said, in a tone that indicated this ought to explain everything.  
  
There was a soft 'whump' as someone flung themselves down in the space between Harry and Ron. Harry moved over out of habit, then did a double- take and grinned. The speeding visitor was none other than Cho-hui Chang.  
  
"Any of you here have 'Hogwarts - a History'?" she inquired.  
  
Hermione rummaged in her backpack, removed the book, and passed it to Cho.  
  
Cho beamed. "I ought to have known you'd have it. You have everything, invariably."  
  
She leafed through the book (Draco moved to loom over her shoulder) and stopped in the middle. "HA!" she exclaimed. "I thought so." She pointed at a photo full of young men and women with brooms, waving at the camera and jostling each other about.  
  
"Hey, Quidditch!" Harry said.  
  
"It's the Ravenclaw team from Professor Snape's sixth year," Cho said. "See the one on the left looking as if he's plotting something hideous?"  
  
Everyone crowded around Cho.  
  
"Arghg," Harry said, getting a bit squashed. Draco made a sort of warbly sound - he was being shoved against Cho's elbow.  
  
"Severus Oneiros Yumejirou Snape," Hermione read, eyes wide. "But he doesn't look any older now than."  
  
"Yes he does," Ron said. "Not much, but he does. Mostly in his face." He tried to imitate Snape's usual exasperated expression.  
  
"Why wasn't Professor Snape on the Slytherin team?" Parvati asked.  
  
"Maybe he was a Ravenclaw," guessed Neville.  
  
"Then why would they make him the head of Slyhterin house?"  
  
Draco moved about so he wasn't being flattened or pushing Cho off the bench. "My mum's old friends with Professor Snape.he was on the Ravenclaw team simply because he didn't approve of the 'modified rules' the Slytherin team liked to play by. Plus my mum was on the Ravenclaw team, and she lobbied for him to join. They were short players that year. He took up as a Chaser.mum and Aunt Echo were the Beaters.and I have no idea who the rest of these people are, but that one has a stupid haircut."  
  
"You're one to talk of silly hair," Cho teased. 


End file.
